


Leave the Lights On

by dandelion_weed



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Human AU, M/M, No Hale Fire, OCD - Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, suicides
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-11
Updated: 2015-11-11
Packaged: 2018-05-01 03:42:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5190851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dandelion_weed/pseuds/dandelion_weed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Love is not a mistake.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Leave the Lights On

_“The first time I saw him,”_ the man on the screen said, a smile playing on his lips and he was so beautiful with the love shining in his eyes. _“My head went quiet. The words that keep replaying and the images that keep refreshing, gone. Poof. When you have OCD, your head is never empty. You never get a quiet moment. Even in bed, I keep thinking if I locked—I locked—I locked—I locked—“_ He stopped to grip at his hair before continuing. _“The door or not.”_ He took a deep breath _. “When I saw him, all I could think of was the curve of his lips and the green of his eyes—his eyes—his eyes—his eyes—“_

Derek bites down on his fingers, eyes transfixed on Stiles’s face. He’s on the verge of tears in the screen, and that fucking hurts so bad. Derek wants to stop watching but Erica made him promise to finish. He owes Stiles at least this. To hear his last words.

That doesn’t make it _okay_.

At the end of this, Stiles will still be dead. The world will keep moving and Derek…Derek wants to _break_ something. Nothing will ever be okay again. Stiles is gone and it’s all _Derek’s fault_.

 _“And then I had to talk to him,”_ Stiles continued, breathing heavily and smiling breathtakingly.

When did Derek starts forgetting everything that made him fall in love with Stiles in the first place? When did everything gone fucking wrong until all that is left is an empty house and ashes of their memories? When did he stop saying ‘I love you’ in the morning just to see Stiles smile and keep saying it at least ten times because Derek wants Stiles to know that and never doubt it?

 _“I asked him out six times in thirty seconds,”_ Stiles said, his eyes watery. And Derek can see it now. He’s falling apart and Derek was not there. He’s fucked off to his family’s house the week before. _“He said yes after the third times but it didn’t feel right so I had to keep going!”_ Derek remembered that even when they were apart. How could he forget? Stiles had smiled, but he kept asking until Derek pushed his phone number to him and left with a kiss on Stiles’s cheek. “ _On our first date I kept rearranging my curly fries and spent more time with it than fucking talk to him!”_ Stiles finished, breathing heavily. Then, he looked to the camera and his lips thinned but the edge curved up. _“But he loved it,”_ Stiles said, face overflowing with wonder as if he couldn’t believe it. “ _He loved it that I kissed him goodbye sixteen times or twenty times. He loved it that I walked so slowly because there are cracks on the sidewalk!”_

Derek doesn’t swallow the sob. He lets it all out. He fucking did this. He took this away from Stiles. He robbed a beautiful man of a beautiful life. He robbed Stiles of a love that he deserved.

 _“When we moved in together, he said he felt so safe because I definitely locked the door eighteen times!”_ Stiles’s voice rose at the end. He’s smiling. Derek misses him like he misses the love that they shared. _“I watched him when he talked—he talked—he talked—he talked—“_ Stiles stopped to bite at his lips. New tears wash Derek’s cheeks, because if he were there, he would kiss Stiles to stop it. And then Stiles would continue talking with a wide smile. It used to be Derek’s favorite thing. He will never get a chance to do it again. “ _When he said he loved me, his lips would curl up at the edges. At night, he lay at bed and watched me turn the lights off and on and off and on and off and on. He closed his eyes and imagined that days and nights were just passing through in front of him.”_

Derek stops there, because he can’t breathe.

He’s a fucking idiot. He’s a fucking idiot for walking out. He never should have left. He should have had more patience. Stiles didn’t deserve to be left behind. Derek is a fucking idiot _heshouldhavebeentheonewhodiedwhyStilesgivehimbackGodgivehimback—_

So many impossible should haves.

He calls Erica.

“I can’t do this.”

Erica’s voice is furious and cracked. “I don’t fucking care if you can’t. You keep watching that or I’ll tie you to that sofa and play it on loop for the rest of your fucking miserable life!”

She hangs up.

 _“Some mornings, I want to kiss him goodbye but he just leaves because I’m making him late for work.”_ Stiles’s face changed. He’s confused and heartbroken. Because of Derek. _“When I stopped at the crack on the side walk, he just kept walking. When he said he loved me, his mouth was a straight line.”_

And that just fucking hurts. Derek’s sobs come out ragged and his chest hurts like someone punched him there repeatedly. _StilesStilesStilesStilesI’msorryI’msorryIloveyouIloveyousomuchpleacecomeback—_

“ _He told me I was taking up too much of his time. Last week, he started sleeping at his family’s house. He told me he shouldn’t have let me got too attached to him—”_ Derek stops breathing. Keening noises come out of his mouth to prevent himself from screaming. _“—because the whole thing was a mistake.”_

It was a mistake. It was a fucking mistake. Stiles would have been alive and happier if he hadn’t met Derek. But Stiles’s next words did it for him.

_“But how can it be a mistake when I don’t have to wash my hands after I touched him? Love is not a mistake. It’s killing me that he can go out there and find someone new and I just can’t. I can’t find someone new because I always think of him.”_

When Derek met Stiles’s father, he was told that Stiles loved fiercely. Once he loved something or someone, that love is utterly devoted and only in death will it stop. Derek had forgotten that because he’s a selfish asshole. A man lost his son and only family member because of Derek’s mistake.

Derek took that love in his greedy hands and stepped on it.

 _“He is the first beautiful thing I ever got stuck on. I want to wake up every morning next to him until I grow old and grey—old and grey—old and grey—old and grey—“_ Stiles pulled at his hair and gritted his teeth together, cheeks wet with tears. _“Now, I just think of how I lost I am without him. He didn’t care that our kisses weren’t perfect because to him they are the most perfect kisses in the world.”_

And they are, they really are. Nobody can compare to Stiles and his smiles and his kisses. He had so much ahead of him. Derek could have given him more kisses and more love and more memories. They could have grown old together because Derek wants to, he really wants to.

Stiles is the only love he’d ever known and had.

Derek sobs into his palms as Stiles’s lasts words wash over him. He loves him. He loves him so much. Why did everything have to go wrong?

 _“I want him back…so bad!”_ Stiles sobbed, and the last of Derek’s heart is broken all over again. It takes a long while before Stiles was calm again. He looked to the camera and gave a wan smile.

_“I leave the door unlocked.”_

_“I leave the lights on.”_

_Nononononono **NO—**_

_“So come back, Derek. I promise I’ll be better. I love you. Please come back.”_

Derek cries until he has no more tears to give.

* * *

One week after Stiles Stilinski’s funeral, the Hale family buries their son beside him.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> There are mistakes because tears were running down my cheeks and blurring my eyes. This is based on an old video I found in my laptop. The man's name is Neil Hilborn and he was talking about his partner who left. Most of Stiles's dialogues come from him so I take no credit. It always leaves me in tears.


End file.
